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JAKE DANNA STEVENS / TIMES-SHAMROCK Animal pens at the former Nay Aug Park Zoo in Scranton are falling apart, contain litter and are overgrown with weeds. The Scranton-based nonprofit St. Cats hopes to use the building for its operation.

A fix may be in the works for Scranton’s rundown, vacant former Nay Aug Park Zoo.

A nonprofit organization that traps, neuters and releases feral cats hopes to use the shuttered zoo building for its operation. The Scranton-based St. Cats, (pronounced Street Cats), proposed the idea and Scranton Mayor Bill Courtright and his solicitor are reviewing it, according to the mayor and St. Cats’ founder Joanne Davis.

“We’re trying to help save the cats in the area and we would use it (the zoo) for that,” Davis said.

Details of the preliminary concept have not been fleshed out.

“They’re going to come forward with a plan before we allow them to do anything,” Courtright said.

However, he does not want the neglected zoo to fall into further disrepair. Having St. Cats repair the building and maintain a presence there would benefit that group as well as the park and its users, he said.

Established last year, St. Cats favors trapping, neutering and releasing feral cats over euthanization. Courtright said he is impressed by St. Cats’ dedication and passion.

“I truly believe they’ll do the right thing with the building,” Courtright said. “They’re going to renovate the property. That, to me, is very important. Hopefully, it (their use of the zoo) will help their cause and it will beautify that area of the park.”

St. Cats works with the Eastern Pennsylvania Animal Alliance of Brodheadsville, a nonprofit spay/neuter clinic, Davis said. St. Cats traps feral cats the night before an EPAA vehicle called a ‘spaymobile’ comes to the city once a week, she said. The fixed cats are released in the areas where they were trapped, she said.

If the zoo plan is approved, fixed cats would not be released in Nay Aug Park, Davis and Courtright said. She also said the proposed use of the zoo building would not be a feral-cat shelter, as cats would not be kept or sheltered there long-term.

“It would only be a place to hold them until we get the (EPAA) vehicle to come and fix them,” Davis said.

First, however, the mayor said Scranton city solicitor Jason Shrive has to determine who has control over the zoo building — the administration or Scranton Recreation Authority. As a result, Courtright said he and Shrive also told St. Cats to fly its proposal by the solicitor for the Scranton Recreation Authority.

Efforts to reach the solicitor of the recreation authority and its chairman were unsuccessful.

The mayor said he doesn’t want to give false hope to St. Cats that the zoo would be available, only to have the authority in control and say no.

“I’m just trying to err on the side of caution,” Courtright said. “Once we know it’s under our (the administration’s) control, then we’ll work on the logistics (of rent and utilities). We will get all of our ducks in a row — all of our cats in a row.”

Whether the storied zoo’s future involves a new chapter with feral cats remains to be seen.

The Nay Aug Park Zoo opened in 1920 as one of the best in the country and was long a source of civic pride, boasting beloved elephants, ferocious lions and mischievous monkeys. However, by the time the zoo closed in 1989, it was routinely rated among the worst and had become an embarrassing concrete jungle prone to shoddy animal care and deaths, mishaps and escapes.

The tenure of another operator that took over in 2003, Genesis Wildlife Center, also was checkered and it closed in 2009. Later plans to convert the closed zoo into an educational or visitor center never panned out and the building has remained a vacant eyesore. Weeds grow rife in front of a row of small cages where animals used to swelter or shiver on bare cement. Front doors are marred by graffiti and a peek through the doors’ windows shows the interior is a jumbled mess. The dilapidated zoo sticks out like a sore thumb in the popular park, the mayor said.

“I just want to keep the park as nice as it is,” Courtright said. “It’s fallen into disrepair over where the zoo is.”

jlockwood@timesshamrock.com

@jlockwoodTT

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